'Huge mistake to play France friendly', says Scotland's Go

[Officer Barbrady]

The real problem we have is that we appear to be constantly on the lookout for a Svengali to show everyone where they are going wrong, from player development at basic level to even telling the blazers how to do their job. This is why only the desperate or the contented will ever touch the job, because the players should be there, and in my opinion they already are, but the creation of a faux complex from an early age seems to prevent them believing they belong at any reasonable level.

We got extremely lucky with Vogts' persistence in how he tried to find players of any sort of quality, albeit this only manifested itself in the immediate years after his departure. He didn't persevere with Kevin Kyle, or Gareth Williams, or an entire group of players just because they were all he had, but those who demonstrated the required level were given time to develop.

None of this was Berti's job, a production line of hungry, skilled, capable footballers is the remit of the SFA and no-one else, and for that, Strachan again appears the ideal man....his employers gave the country what it wanted, and in turn gave him what HE wanted, and now he's at the forefront of the next 'blueprint' for player development. No conflict of interest, then, in the current manager writing off the current batch. You wouldn't have a club manager encouraging an Arab billionaire taking over his club so he could buy decent players, because his current ones are shit, so why is this particular odious twat being treated as some sort of prophet?

[Guest DAVIDB69]

The real problem we have is that we appear to be constantly on the lookout for a Svengali to show everyone where they are going wrong, from player development at basic level to even telling the blazers how to do their job. This is why only the desperate or the contented will ever touch the job, because the players should be there, and in my opinion they already are, but the creation of a faux complex from an early age seems to prevent them believing they belong at any reasonable level.

We got extremely lucky with Vogts' persistence in how he tried to find players of any sort of quality, albeit this only manifested itself in the immediate years after his departure. He didn't persevere with Kevin Kyle, or Gareth Williams, or an entire group of players just because they were all he had, but those who demonstrated the required level were given time to develop.

None of this was Berti's job, a production line of hungry, skilled, capable footballers is the remit of the SFA and no-one else, and for that, Strachan again appears the ideal man....his employers gave the country what it wanted, and in turn gave him what HE wanted, and now he's at the forefront of the next 'blueprint' for player development. No conflict of interest, then, in the current manager writing off the current batch. You wouldn't have a club manager encouraging an Arab billionaire taking over his club so he could buy decent players, because his current ones are shit, so why is this particular odious twat being treated as some sort of prophet?

The problem is the above will be repeated when we have a squad full of 35 year olds who all need replaced at the same time , but we will have no one as players are not developed.

Similar to the mess Craig brown left us with accept his oldies were much better than this lot , so eventually loads of young players will need to be thrown in

Only in Scotland are players in their mid 20s termed young

[Officer Barbrady]

Broon is a very good example. I strongly believe that had we taken McCann, Ritchie and Cameron to France 98 instead of duds like Whyte, Elliott, Booth or Gemmill, the experience may have helped us make a better job of the following campaigns. You could throw in Davidson and Burchill into that mix, also, as both featured in the England fixtures after very few caps.

These are things which good managers prepare for, with the reward coming to those brave enough to make the big decisions. However, we shouldn't automatically shut off players based purely on age, didn't Durrant enjoy probably his best spell in a Scotland shirt in 99, aged about 33, beating Germany and almost the Czechs? It works both ways, but largely i agree....the selection policies of a long line of managers have reaped what we now have as a standard.